Beach Going Life

Happy interNational Scrapbook Day my friends! I'm hosting an event on the Simple Scrapper Facebook page. We're chatting, I'm issuing challenges and also playing along! Here's what I did for Challenge No. 1! [Read more here]

I was so inspired by these, I knew I wanted to use them for a page. This is what I came up with! I filmed it, so expect a process video here soon!

cheers & besos,

Elle's Studio Spring Sale

It's happening! Head over to Elle's Studio to shop the spring [sale]! There are grab bags and individual items on mega discount.

While I was at it, I thought I'd share a page I made using this month's Elle's Studio [sketch]. As I'm a huge fan of circles, I totally loved this sketch! I rotated the elements 90 degrees and so much fun layering my photos, acrylic words and stamped pieces.

I completely loved the "We are living our Adventure" journaling tag from the [April kit]. But couldn't make the 3x4 size work. So I just cut out the sentiment placed it along the bottom of my photo. Totally made it work!

I used the [Travelouge stamps] and the [Go, See, Do acrylic words] to embellish this page.

And I used the arrows from the [puffy stickers] pack to help guide your eye around the page. Hands down, puffy stickers have to be my favorite type of embellishment!

cheers & besos,

Photo of the Photo...

I'm determined to scrapbook as much of my 2008 travels as possible this year. I've even made it part of my scrapbook goals! This is a photo I took in Prague, a country I've barely scrapbooked about! Even though this trip was one of my most favorite trips ever in life.

I used the Scrapbook Circle February kit and was challenged by Tessa to use this great marble print. So many of the domes in that city were a similar color, so I thought it'd be fun to pair it with them.

Journaling Reads:
I took some really epic photos on this trip. But this one topped them all. It’s a photo of Mark taking a photo of Kevin taking a photo of Jon. I also love the couple embracing on the side. And the lady’s head is so perfectly framed in the dome. It’s one of my favorite photos that I’ve ever taken. It instantly takes me back to this trip with those boys. Absolutely one of the best trips of my life!

Tessa also is blogging about this over on the Scrapbook Circle blog. Head over there to read more!

cheers & besos,

Christmas Markets

December means its Christmas market time in Europe! They are seriously some of the most magical places to wander and explore. Last year, I visited the one in Basel, Switzerland. 

I instagrammed the heck out of it! So when I was making the layout, I decided to keep my photos square. The design is based of a Simple Scrapper sketch (No. 258 for the members).

I love when a group of products so perfectly matches photos. For me, the Good Cheer kit from Scrapbook Circle + two shades of blue cardstock, just so perfectly encapsulated the vibe of the market.

I blogged about this over on the Scrapbook Circle blog last month. If you want to check it out there and take a look at the kit, click here.

This is honestly one of my most favorite Christmas pages ever! I just love how it all came together =)

cheers & besos,

From Paris to Today

Matt and I have traveled together dozens of times. But the first ever trip we took together was to Paris in 2009. We were living in London at the time, so it was a quick weekend getaway. It was his first visit, so we got in all of the highlights: the Eiffel Tower, the Louvre, Notre Dame. 

These few photos are pretty much the only ones we took. I was more intent on spending time with him than taking tons of photos. And I think that's totally ok sometimes! And I love these photos so much too, they feel very touristy and old school European holiday.

The story here is all about how far we've come in the seven years that we've been together. When we were in Paris in 2009, neither one of us had any clue what the future held or even when we'd next be seeing each other. It was a very uncertain time. Fast forward to today, when we definitely have much more security about our careers, lives and each other.

I used a Simple Scrapper sketch from the November collection as the starting point for this page. I love the look of a double page 8 1/2 x 11 and was so excited to see this sketch in the collection. For my fellow Simple Scrappers, this is sketch No. 276.

I recently purchased Ashli Oliver's The Softer Side class. I'm such a fan of Ashli's work and her amazing style. This page was my interpretation of her style, with the softer color scheme (all papers Gramercy Road from Gossamer Blue). I will definitely be incorporating more of her techniques into (or should it be onto....) my pages. Check it out if you haven't already! 

cheers & besos,

Summer Camp Challenge

I kind of can't remember the last time I was this excited to share a page! I spent a quiet Friday evening putting this together. 

Jennifer posted a fun challenge called Summer Camp in the Simple Scrapper Facebook Group. It was a re-run of a fun challenge/event the community did in 2013, before I joined. So this whole exercise was new to me. I had so much fun playing along!

Without giving anything about the challenge away, here's the direction I was given for my page:

Story Direction-Event or Trip
Page Background-White or cream cardstock
Paper Selection-No patterned paper
Journaling Style-Long column
Design Foundation-Asymmetrical clusters
Embellishing Rule-Mixed title work

I wasn't at all worried about not being able to use any patterned paper. And it definitely helped that my background was white cardstock. Because then I was able to create my own background with the help of mists and stencils and stamps!

It also meant that my photos and the colors I worked with really popped of the page!

Event or Trip was my assigned subject. I did one better and combined the two. The page is about an international music and dance festival we just happened to wander into when I visited Prague.

What better to scrapbook this adventure with, than my Ali Edwards "Go" Story Stamp & Kit. I loved all of the orange in it so I played that up as much as I could. I pulled out two journaling cards, just one of the chipboard pieces, the acetate geotag, plastic "go" and of course, the Story Stamps.

I used just about every last one of the stamp phrases and paired it with my Hero Arts Ombre Butter to Orange ink pad. It's subtle but I kept the ombre going when I stamped down in a long column on the left of my page. I sprinkled my journaling in with all of the stamping.

The embellishing included a lot of geotags and the stamped "awesome memory". I also mixed two sets of alphas and my own handwriting to create the title. The "go" could be considered part of the title, but really I see it more as embellishing.

I love playing along with challenges. The more restricted, the more I end up loving the pages. At least that's how it seems. This page is definitely evidence of that for me. I love love love how it turned out!

To my fellow Simple Scrappers, Jennifer posted the Summer Camp Challenge in the Facebook group on June 29 if you're looking for it.

If you're not a Simple Scrapper member, there's more info on it here.

cheers & besos,

Travel Anxiety

I have so many creative team projects to share with you this month! This is a Simple Scrapper creation using a sketch from the (soon to be released) April Spark magazine, and an older Story Starter. 

To note: Simple Scrapper just upgraded to a new fantastic website! Hence the bit of the delay. Promise this month's Spark will be worth it! And hey, there's also an awesome new website!

I used the Studio Calico Odyssey kit for this page about my travel anxiety. There's lots of journaling there for you to read. The gist of it is that I've been a million and one places but I still have anxiety about traveling. I'm thankful it isn't so bad as to stop me. But it's one of those pieces of my story that you might not guess. Especially considering how much I travel!

I wanted to highlight something I do fairly often on my pages, especially lately it seems. I love to layer photos on top of each other and make my own mini flip books.

For these photos, I matted them on a transparency and created the flip book using that awesome yellow washi. I wanted to make sure that you could tell there were other photos behind the main one. So I staggered the images a bit, so they were peaking out.

Probably something I shouldn't highlight but I'm going to do it anyway, is the mess ups I made. I did a bit of stamping around the top of the page and instantly regretted/hated it! So my solution was to just cover it up with scraps of the same paper (thankfully I had some!).

It's one of those things that adds just a bit more texture. And while the background image is "off" in a few places, I don't think it's too distracting. Or another way to look at it, it's not half as distracting as the stamping I did!

I added one more strip at the bottom to give it some balance. And also, because I knew I wanted to print that sentiment and at this point, there was no way the whole layout was going through my printer.

cheers & besos,

Places you'll Go

The theme of the fall was travel. And travel I did! I made this page in October using an awesome The Cut Shoppe digital cut file. 

I also pulled out some of the great travel products I buy and then rarely use! (Talked about that on the Paperclipping Roundtable a few months back) It seems they come out when I'm telling stories that are more big picture.

I punched some paper airplanes and tried to sew in a circle. I also printed my journaling out on a transparency.

I pulled one photo from each of the cities I visited in those 5 weeks. Anaheim, Palm Springs, DC, London, Glasgow, St. Andrew's, Aberdeen & Edinburgh. And I printed them as tiny instagrams all in a row.

Looking back at this page I'm  thinking "how cute, you thought you'd done a lot of traveling". And since then (and because I took forever to finish then share this page) I've been to Baton Rouge, Ohio, San Antonio, London, Hull & Basel, Switzerland.

I told you travel was the theme of the fall! I'll have to make Part 2 page for the rest of the cities. Next up I'll be in New Orleans for a day and San Antonio for Christmas. After that I'm done with traveling for a bit! Well…at least until the end of January.

cheers & besos,

PRT 218: Paper Chains

Erhmagawd! Coming off of a small PRT high you guys :) I just finished recording this week's Paperclipping Roundtable! I was so honored and excited to be asked. Here's the link to the recording if you want to go listen (please do!): http://www.paperclipping.com/prt218-paper-chains/

If you're visiting because you've heard the episode, hi! Welcome to my little alley off the internet. 

Here's my "official" scrapbook bio:

My name is Jamie Leija (said correctly by Noell as "Lay-ha"). I’m a native Texan who loves to travel and scrapbook. I’ve lived in London, Thailand and Spain and have been blessed to travel to so many more places. Traveling and scrapbooking go hand in hand for me. I love that one hobby supports the other and that scrapbooking lets me relive and share all of those fabulous memories. I've been scrapbooking (as we know it) for the past 17 years. My first job in high school was for a local scrapbook store. I loved working there! And it helped me learn to love sharing this hobby with others. In college, I worked at Hobby Lobby (can you see the theme here :) and then another local scrapbook store. I've been published in Northridge Publishing's Scrapbook Trends, CARDS and Create publications. When I’m not scrapbooking or on a plane, I’m spending time with my kitten (who I hope you couldn't hear on the recording!!), boyfriend or adorable nephew.

The topic of the episode was travel scrapbooking, something so clearly right up my alley :) But more specifically, design around travel pages. We talked about a few of my pages so I'm sharing them again here. Also, if you click on the photo it will link you back to the original blog post for the page.

It was so surreal to go from listening to the Podcasts to actually participating in one. I had this weird moment in the beginning listening to Izzy go over some housekeeping stuff. I literally had to remind myself, Izzy is talking to you this time! =) 

I'll leave it at that for now. I hope you'll go and listen to the episode for more on these pages! Just want to send a huge shout out to Noell & Izzy for the awesome things they do for our industry. And for the huge honor and privilege of being part of the legacy :) And also to my new friend Wendy Morris who was a newb with me on today's episode.

cheers & besos,